Surnames of Occupation

I nspite of the large numbers which have become obsolete, surnames of occupation are more numerous than would at first ap-pear and their classification is often difficult. We have already seen that many local surnames really denote a man’s occupation, 1 e.g. Castle, John del Castel (1307 Wak), may mean ‘dweller by a castle’, but is more likely to be equivalent to Castleman, one employed at a castle. In fact, we find also Richard Castell alias Casteler (1554 NQ 198, 4) where the lost alternative makes it clear we have here a parallel to Kitchen and Kitchener. Tabor ‘drum’ is used for ‘drummer’, Pepper was a dealer in pepper, a pepperer or Spicer, for which we still have also the metonymic Spice. This frequent use of metonymy gives a satisfactory explanation of such names as Meale, Orledge or Orlich (OFr orloge ‘clock’), Purse, etc. 2 The numerous compounds of -man, -smith, -wright, -maker and -monger will be discussed in the following chapter. 3